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Jun 12, 2017 | 01:16

Macron's party set for big French parliamentary majority

President Emmanuel Macron's fledgling party is set to trounce France's traditional main parties in a parliamentary election and secure a huge majority to push through his pro-business reforms, projections after the first round show. Scarlett Cvitanovich reports.

TRANSCRIPT +

French president Emmanuel Macron on course for historic gains.
His fledgling party Republic on the Move set to trounce the traditional opposition in the parliamentary election.
Pollsters predict the party and its centre-right ally Modem could win as many as three-quarters of the seats in the lower house after this Sunday's (18 June) run-off, meaning Macron's pro-business reforms are almost guaranteed to get through.
The party more than 10 points ahead of its nearest challengers, the conservative Republican party and its allies.
Marine Le Pen's National Front party, facing its second big defeat in a month.
Projected to win just a small handful of seats, perhaps as few as one.
But it was the Socialists that suffered the most.
The former ruling party set to win just 30-40 seats.
And there is one negative for Macron.
Only one in two voters turning out in Sunday's (June 11) first round - a record low post-war, causing opposition leaders to urge their supporters to mobilise for the runoff.
For now prime minister Edouard Philippe is hailing the success of the radical new grouping.
Saying on television after the result "France is back".

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